I am your common man, but not terribly common. If in a thousand years you picked me out of a crowd, you’d say, “Yes, he is quite representative of his times.” On the other hand, if you picked me out of a crowd today, you’d say, “He’s a bit unusual.”

On the outside, the case is apparent. I am part of a small minority of people who have been to war; I attend an elite institution; I am a racial minority in America; I had kids before the age of thirty. I’m quite blessed in so many ways.

Inside my heart, however, I feel a deep churning like the cold waters of the deep Pacific feeding life to kelp forests along the American West Coast. Deep, deafening in its volume and enormity, but silent and unknown. Yet, from deep within these waters arise rich nutrients feeding life.

I seldom watch war movies, but when I do, I usually find them unbearable. In the inevitable scene of profound loss, whether it’s the loss of a comrade or a loss of the sense of self, I find myself transported. I’m in the war again. I’m young, naive, and impressionable. I’ve almost died a few times and I have made peace with my own death. Then, I remember coming back home, after the war, thinking, “I’ve learned to live with my own death for so long. Now I’m back and I’m supposed to live. How do I do that when I was ready to die?”

Then the movies unfold, and the films’ protagonists inevitably act out what I felt over years in a split second. The rush of pain and suffering. The gnawing sense of death inside you.

In my suffering, I’ve realized it is easy to feel superior to others. I am a better person for having gone through the worst of humanity. I am thankful I haven’t taken that road. Rather, I find myself empathizing more. Having gone through my suffering, I understand the suffering of those oppressed by the state (Palestinians), those pushed out of their homes and forces to travel dangerous lands (the Rohingya and the Syrians), and those killed in the name of property (Native Americans and African Americans).